How the West Was Shot: The Evolution of the Western Genre

Annie Oakley, the 'Little Miss Sure Shot' of the 'Wild West' gives an exhibition of rifle shooting at glass balls and clay pigeons in a film from the Edison Catalog.

A fine exhibition of horsemanship by Lee Martin, a genuine cowboy. This particular broncho is an unusually wicked one. (from Edison Films)

Three Sioux Indians perform a 'buffalo dance', while two others use drums to supply a rhythm. The three dancers move around in a circle as they perform the various actions that are part of the dance.

A group of Sioux Indians from Buffalo Bill's Wild West exhibition demonstrates a dance called a "ghost dance".

During the Alaska gold rush, one way to reach the Klondike was over the Chilkoot Pass. A stationary camera is placed to see a ways down the curving trail. A pack train comes into view and passes in front of us, led by a man on horseback. Eight loaded mules follow, then another cowboy on horseback and a man walking, then eight more laden mules, another cowboy, then nine more mules, a cowboy, and still the pack train stretches as far as the eye can see. A solitary man watches from atop a hillock.

A vignette of a barroom/liquor-store in the West, no plot per se. However this short is usually regarded as the first "Western" in the sense that it depicts a western scene.

Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show parades down New York's Fifth Avenue. Filmed on 1 April 1901.

A group of bandits stage a brazen train hold-up, only to find a determined posse hot on their heels.

A cowboy gets involved in the kidnapping and rescue of a pretty young girl.

From the point of view of the front end of a train, a group of robbers on a handcar rob the train and murder one of its crew.

From the front of a cable car, a motion picture camera records a trip down Market Street, San Francisco, California, from a point between 8th & 9th Streets, Eastward to the cable car turnaround at the Ferry Building.

Originally 70 minutes in running time, only 17 minutes of the world's first full-length narrative feature film survived in stills and other fragments and tell the story of Ned Kelly, an infamous 19th-century Australian outlaw.

Bill Going is the star pitcher for his local Choctaw baseball team. Gamblers from Jimtown try to persuade him to throw the game and he shoots and kills them. He is given a reprieve to pitch the last game of the year.

A frantic child reports to the tribal chief that her father killed her mother. The tribe chases and captures the man, dragging him back for tribal justice.

A story laid in the Great Yosemite Valley during the eighties. Col. Westley has an only daughter who is the one softening influence in his rugged nature. She is fond of taking morning rides over the trails, and is usually accompanied by Robt. Adams, a sergeant at the post, and who is detailed by the father to look after her safety. The companionship of these young people soon ripens into love, and despite the disparity of the rank of Adams and his sweetheart's father, they plight their troth. At the opening of the story we see them riding away from the post. Upon arriving at Nevada Falls, a favorite spot, they leave their horses and proceed on foot in order that they may ascend to a more advantageous height from which to view the gorgeous scenery that surrounds the grand historical Yosemite Valley. While engaged in this pastime, an Indian renegade steals their horses, leaving them afoot many miles from the post. The evening is stealing upon them when they discover their loss and in their effort to follow the footprints of their horses they lose their way and are compelled to spend the night in the wilderness. The Colonel becoming alarmed, sends out a searching party that finally succeeds in finding the missing couple. Upon returning to the post the sergeant is placed under arrest, despite the pleading of his unhappy sweetheart. Now a lapse of n month occurs and we see a thrilling battle with the Indians, in which the Colonel, accompanied by his daughter, is cut off from the men and about to be taken by the redskins. It is at this time that Adams, only a private, shows his heroism by making a desperate dash through the lines of the enemy, rescuing the Colonel and his daughter from the murderous savages, though wounded almost to death. His recovery and promotion to 1st Lieutenant soon follow, and with the consent of the Colonel to his marriage with the lady of his choice, ends a pretty story of love, heroism and devotion to duty.

Ramona is a little orphan of the great Spanish household of Moreno. Alessandro, the Indian, arrives at the Camulos ranch with his sheep-shearers, showing his first meeting with Ramona. There is at once a feeling of interest noticeable between them which ripens into love. This Senora Moreno, her foster mother, endeavors to crush, with poor success, until she forces a separation by exiling Alessandro from the ranch. He goes back to his native village to find the white men devastating the place and scattering his people. The Senora, meanwhile, has told Ramona that she herself has Indian blood, which induces her to renounce her present world and go to Alessandro. They are married and he finds still a little shelter left from the wreckage. Here they live until the whites again appear and drive them off, claiming the land. From place to place they journey, only to be driven further until finally death comes to Alessandro just as aid comes in the person of Felipe, the Senora's son, who takes Ramona back to Camulos.

When her father becomes ill, a young woman takes over the telegraph at a lonely western railroad station. She soon has to hold off a pair of ruffians who are bent on stealing the payroll from an arriving train.

A wagon train heading west across the great desert runs out of water, and is attacked by Indians. One man -- their last hope -- is sent out to find water.

An old soldier on the frontier, the father of a dozen children, a staunch patriot himself, brings these children up with rigid military training. He conducts his household as a garrison with strict discipline, drills, etc. On the evening of the day the picture opens, the oldest boy wishes to go out to make a call on his sweetheart, but the old soldier commands the boy to stay at home. This command the boy is loath to obey, but his father, himself brought up under rigid military rule, rails at his insubordination of the boy, and threatens that if the boy goes out he goes for good. The boy does go, however, and returning finds sure enough the door barred against him. Sad and homeless he wanders, but it is fortunate he goes for the next morning he views from a distance a tribe of Indians starting out on the warpath. With this lead, he with valiant effort, secures the aid of a troop of patrolling soldiers, who rescue the boy's family and sweetheart just in time. The military training imbued by the old soldier stood in good, as it was the means of holding the Indians at bay until help arrived.

Custer's final battle against Sitting Bull at Little Bighorn.

When Indians attack a white settlement, a brave kidnaps a white baby to give to his wife as a replacement for their dead baby. The white mother goes to the Indian camp to look for her child and is captured by the Indians who plan to torture her. The settlers attack the Indian camp, destroying it completely and killing the braves, while the Indian wife returns the baby to the white woman and allows her to escape. The Indian wife mourns her baby at its grave, unaware of the destruction of the Indian camp.

Algie Allmore has one year to prove he's a man in order to wed Harry Lyons' daughter.

The fact that an Indian tribe is eating puppies starts an action-packed battle in a Western town.

The story of the massacre of an Indian village, and the ensuing retaliation.

A chivalrous British officer takes the blame for his cousin's embezzlement and journeys to the American West to start a new life on a cattle ranch.